Dark Star

by Bethany Frenette

  “If you’re trying to get me to kick your ass,” she told Mr. Alvarez, “this is the way to do it.” Looking at her, I didn’t doubt it. She’d pulled back her hood, and her hair had come free from its bun, floating wildly about her head—but she looked every inch Morning Star.

  Mr. Alvarez held his hands up in front of him. “Just bring her to Esther, that’s all I’m saying. Right now we have bigger problems. This makes eight confirmed attacks, and they’re accelerating. We were lucky with these last two—”

  Mom gave him a look of disbelief. “Lucky.”

  “Two injured girls instead of two dead ones. We were lucky. You can thank Shane for that, by the way.”

  She snorted. “Yeah, I’ll do that.” Pausing, she tapped her fingers against her arms, then leaned back against the wall. “Did you happen to get a look at the Harrower?”

  “Only a glimpse. It went Beneath before I could reach it. But it wasn’t Tigue, if that’s what you’re asking.”

  Tigue. The name stirred a brief memory, then slipped away. Mom frowned. “Maybe I’m wrong about him. I still can’t link him to anything—but at this point, we don’t have many other choices. Unless someone out there is taking great pains not to be seen.”

  “It wouldn’t be the first time.”

  Her voice was soft. “No. It wouldn’t.” After a moment, she shook herself, rubbing her face with her hands. “We won’t figure this out tonight. And if I’m here, you should be out on the streets.”

  “Already gone,” he said, spinning around and heading out of the room.

  “And, Ryan,” Mom called after him. “Thank you.”

  He lifted a hand to wave, but didn’t turn. “Anytime.”

  As soon as Mr. Alvarez left, my mother sent me up to bed. “It seems we’re going to have to talk,” she said. “But not tonight. You need sleep.”

  Warily, I moved toward the stairs, not meeting her eyes. “You’re not mad?”

  “Trust me,” she said. “I am far beyond mad.”

  ***

  A sound at my window woke me.

  I couldn’t remember climbing the stairs or crawling into my own bed, but the covers were tugged up around me. I hadn’t dreamed; I hadn’t seen that flash of silver, or Tink’s red dress, or Kelly Stevens lying dead—there was only silence and safety. Until that sound, sharp and repeated, intruded.

  I jerked upward in bed, my heart slamming against my ribs.

  It was still dark. Moonlight pushed through my blinds, tossing shadows along the walls. The sound came again, and this time I recognized it.

  Shivering, I wrapped a blanket around me and slid off the bed. I tugged the window open and peered out into the yard.

  Gideon stood below, getting ready to launch another rock. I ducked backward to avoid his aim, but he’d seen me and lowered his arm.

  “I tried calling!” he yelled, cupping his hands around his mouth.

  “Mom is gonna kill you if you break my window again!” I called back.

  I sensed him smiling somewhere down there in the darkness. “I just wanted to make sure you were okay,” he said. “You are okay, aren’t you?”

  I hesitated. I wasn’t all right—but I didn’t know how to say it. I didn’t know how to explain what I’d seen, how the wind had rushed up, and time had frozen and for a second I’d been certain I would die. There weren’t words for that.

  “I’m fine,” I lied. “I’ll tell you about it tomorrow.”

  I closed the window and crawled back into bed, dragging the covers over my head. Weariness swam over me. I didn’t want to think of anything or remember anything or feel anything. I just wanted to sleep, dreamless and dark.

  12

  I didn’t get out of bed for a week.

  Saturday morning, I woke with a sore, swollen throat and aching joints. I coughed so hard I was surprised the city didn’t put me under quarantine. It was an aftereffect, my mother said, the body’s response to being cut by a demon. The same thing had happened to Tink. The effect was like the chicken pox, she said: you could only get it once. But when she tried to explain more than that, I covered my face with my blankets until she went away.

  She returned later, and I rolled to my side as she placed a cool hand on my forehead. I didn’t want to talk to her. I didn’t want her to say whatever it was she was waiting to tell me. And I didn’t want to go back out into a world where words like demon had moved from fiction into reality. I would rather stay in bed, where all I had to worry about was how gross my cough syrup tasted.

  After her first attempt to talk to me failed, Mom seemed to give up. Except to take my temperature and bring me chicken soup, she left me alone. She didn’t even yell at me or tell me I was grounded; she just said we could talk whenever I was ready, brushed her hand over my cheek, and looked concerned.

  She did, however, give me a warning.

  “This isn’t something you tell Gideon,” she said.

  “Right,” I croaked out, keeping my back to her. “I’m going to run straight to him and tell him what a fun time I’m having with demons.” How would I even begin that conversation? Hey, Gideon, you know all those monsters you used to be afraid lived in your closet? The ones your mom assured you didn’t exist? Guess what!

  “I’m serious about this, Audrey. Some things can’t be shared. Okay? You don’t have to look at me, just nod if you understand.”

  I nodded.

  Leon checked in on me now and then, and though I expected another lecture—or at least some very disapproving frowns—he only asked how I was feeling. I told him I was fine and pulled the sheets back up over my head.

  Gideon came to see me on Sunday.

  “You haven’t been answering your phone,” he admonished, seated at the foot of my bed. “And you look terrible.”

  “Thanks,” I said, making a face at him. “Just what every girl wants to hear.” I punctuated this with a cough.

  “You doing okay?”

  I was a little relieved Mom had told me not to tell him. I didn’t want to talk about what had really happened. Not yet. Not for a few decades, at least. I told him I thought the punch was spiked. And that I fell.

  He didn’t believe me, but—unlike me—Gideon wasn’t one to press. He just shook his head and said, “I hope you’re not coming to school looking like that.”

  “I’m not even planning to leave my bed,” I answered.

  By Tuesday I was beginning to feel better, but I still kept trips outside my room to a minimum. I ignored everything except my TV, my computer, and the romance novels I’d made Mom pick up from the library. Tink tried calling a few times and sent me strange, indecipherable texts, but I didn’t respond. I wasn’t ready to talk to her. I was afraid I would ask her what she’d felt, what she’d seen. If something had drawn her out there into the night and she’d turned to a sound, a motion, to find herself alone and not alone. If she’d felt that flicker in the darkness and then that sudden, knifing horror as the light died around her. If she’d known what she was facing.

  We shared this now, and I didn’t want to share it. I wanted to stay hidden, safe in my room, where I could huddle under my covers and ignore the rest of the world.

  But I didn’t feel safe. I wondered if I ever would again.

  ***

  “Don’t you think this has gone on long enough?”

  I looked up from my book. Leon stood in the doorway, leaning against the frame.

  It was Thursday night, and although my sickness—or aftereffect—was gone, I still refused to rejoin the land of the living. The closest I planned to get to outside was my window. I’d left it open. The air felt cool and wet and smelled of rain, which was enough to convince me I was better off indoors.

  “You’re interrupting my reading,” I said. I regarded Leon suspiciously. He hadn’t spent any time yelling at me since Friday, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t about to start again.

  “Get up,” he said. “We’re going out.”

  “I’m not going out,” I p
rotested, faking a cough. “I’m sick.”

  “You’re better.” He stepped toward me. He was as well-dressed as always, but there was a slight nick on the left side of his jaw, where he’d cut himself shaving.

  “It’s going to rain. Or snow. Or both. You never know with Minnesota. We could wander right into a blizzard.”

  He shook his head, advancing another step. “Not tonight.”

  I scooted backward in my bed, pulling my knees against me and dragging the covers to my chin. “I thought you were mad at me, anyway. And I’m not in the mood for lectures.”

  He sighed. “I’m not mad at you.”

  “Fine, but I’m still not going anywhere. It’s the middle of the night.”

  “It’s eight.”

  “I’m in my pajamas.”

  That gave him pause. “Do you smell?”

  “What? No! I showered an hour ago.” I pointed to my damp hair.

  He shrugged. “I don’t see a problem, then.”

  I felt it coming before it happened. I could never read Leon very well—or, okay, at all—but there were certain warning signs I recognized. The way his eyebrows lifted slightly. The wrinkle in his brow. The tilt to his head. Then—

  He turned his Hungry Puppy eyes at me.

  There was no defense against Hungry Puppy.

  “Dammit, Leon! Fine, I’ll go,” I said, kicking away the sheets and climbing out of bed. “I hate it when you do that.”

  Leon was all innocence. He’d reverted to normal, but I wasn’t about to protest again, not when he could go back on attack at any moment. I didn’t think I could handle the Hungry Puppy twice in one night.

  “You are so completely manipulative,” I sniffed.

  He ignored that. Seeing that he’d won his battle, he hustled me downstairs, pausing by the front closet to wrap me in a coat, and steered me out the door.

  “We’re riding?” I asked. “Not taking Air Leon?”

  “A drive will be good for you. You could use the fresh air.”

  He was right about the weather. Clouds were thick and low in the sky and the air was damp, but it wasn’t even sprinkling, and the night was still too warm for snow. I didn’t ask where we were going, but hopped up behind him on his motorcycle and leaned forward.

  We headed north, onto the freeway, west across the river and out of Minneapolis. Past the city, we took sleepy back roads where the traffic was quiet and the lanes empty, save for a few late commuters headed back to the suburbs. The drive was soothing, but it didn’t take long. Less than half an hour passed before Leon slowed and I heard the crunch of gravel beneath us.

  I slid off the bike and looked around. He’d brought us to a lake. Considering there were about a billion of them in the state, I wasn’t certain which one. The area where we stood wasn’t large, just a circle of red picnic tables with peeling paint, a few grills jutting up out of the grass, and a thin path of packed dirt that led toward the water. In the distance, the surface of the lake glittered with stars. The clouds above us had scattered.

  I didn’t like it. It felt empty, exposed. I turned to Leon. “We’re here...why exactly?”

  “I come out here to think sometimes,” he said. He turned, his hands in his pockets, and stared skyward. A sliver of moon rose small and distant between the clouds. After a moment, he shrugged and faced me. “And I thought we should get you out of the house before you grew roots.”

  I hunched my shoulders. The chill in the air had deepened. Around me, everything was very still. “If this is an intervention, could we please do it some place less . . . open?”

  “It’s all right for you to be scared,” Leon said. He’d hopped up onto one of the picnic tables and sat with his elbows on his knees, leaning forward, looking at me. In the meager light, his eyes were dark and unreadable—but his voice was kind.

  “Great,” I answered, turning away from him. Somehow his sympathy bothered me more than his disapproval. “Glad I have your permission. Can we go home now?”

  He snorted. “So you can get to work boarding up the windows?”

  I spun about. “What do you want from me? Yes, I’m scared! I’m terrified! Happy?”

  “Audrey.”

  “Let’s get this over with,” I muttered. “Now that I’m your captive audience, go ahead—lecture away.”

  He was silent a moment. I watched him warily. With a quick, graceful movement, he jumped down from the picnic table and bent, crouching in the grass. His hand curled around a rock, which he flung into the darkness. It skipped across the path and disappeared. Finally, he stood, looking at me as he said, “I’m sorry I yelled at you.”

  I didn’t speak. I stared at him, confused, wondering what alternate universe I’d stepped into.

  He wasn’t finished. “But what you did was still stupid.”

  That was more like it.

  “You didn’t have to drag me out here to tell me that,” I grumbled. “I am well aware of your views on my intelligence.”

  “I said what you did was stupid,” he said, giving me a look stuck somewhere between irritation and impatience. “There’s a difference.”

  Yet another episode of Leon Knows Best. I was more than a little sick of it. My hands tightened into fists.

  “What did you expect?” I demanded. “That I wouldn’t be curious? That I wouldn’t be worried? I knew something had happened. Good job, lying to a psychic.”

  A muscle in his jaw twitched. Silence. I had him there. But I wasn’t one for quitting while I was ahead. “It wasn’t just some feeling,” I said. “It was something I Knew. I couldn’t ignore what it was telling me. And maybe it was a stupid idea, but I had to trust it since no one else would tell me the truth.”

  He moved forward, closing the distance between us. “So you sensed danger and your first impulse was to run directly into it. Again. That’s really not the sort of instinct you want to trust.”

  “Right—because you’re clearly the poster boy for cautious living. Or do you think I’ve forgotten how you just showed up out of nowhere and decided to play superhero?”

  “I didn’t have any choice in the matter, and believe me: I don’t play.” I tried to turn away, but Leon took hold of my shoulders, fixing me where I stood. His voice was quiet, intent. “Did it never occur to you that there might be a reason we weren’t telling you things? That there was a reason we told you to stay away from the Drought and Deluge?”

  “Well, maybe if you’d said, ‘Stay away from the Drought and Deluge, it’s overrun by demons,’ I’d have paid more attention!” I snapped.

  “There are plenty of things out there that can hurt you, and most of them have nothing to do with demons.” Abruptly, he stepped back, releasing me, and let out a strangled sort of sigh. “I didn’t bring you out here to argue.”

  “Why did you bring me out here, then?”

  He didn’t answer. A crisp wind rose around us, tugging at my coat sleeves and ruffling his hair. Then, for the second time that night, Leon surprised me. He gave me a rueful smile and said, “I was trying to make you feel better.”

  I gaped at him. He looked so sheepish, I couldn’t help it: I burst out laughing. “This is your idea of a pep talk?”

  “I could’ve handled it differently,” he admitted. He tucked his hands into his pockets again, looked down, and kicked at the grass. A pebble bounced toward the picnic tables, followed by a clump of dirt. “But you need to understand—”

  There was no way that sentence could end well. I grabbed his arm to get his attention. “You should probably stop talking.”

  He frowned, but obeyed.

  I turned toward the lake. The night was hushed, save for the gentle lap of water. City traffic was distant, a low hum at the edge of my hearing. Now and then a lone car rolled past us, headlights slicing through the darkness. Nothing moved—that I could see.

  “I am scared,” I began. “Of course I’m scared. And maybe I did think it was a game. I thought you guys were just fighting crime or something. All th
is time, I thought you were out there making the Cities safe from—I don’t know. Muggers and murderers, I guess.”

  His voice was gentle. “I know you did.”

  I stared down at my feet. The grass beneath them was dead and brown. It wouldn’t be long before the first snowfall.

  “I don’t know if I can handle this,” I said.

  “You can handle it,” he said. He stepped close to me again, but I kept my eyes focused downward. “Most Kin kids grow up with this knowledge. It’s just the way of life. They adapt to it. So will you.”

  I knew he meant it to be reassuring, but I didn’t feel reassured. I didn’t want to adapt. I kept looking at our feet: my old, scuffed softball tennies and the edge of his black shoes, smudged with dirt. “You’re saying I should just—get up every day and pretend I don’t know what’s out there?”

  “No. But remember that we’re out there too.”

  We. Guardians, he meant. Him, and Mom. And apparently Mr. Alvarez. And others—I supposed it meant others, as well. Other Guardians, out in the streets, watching, fighting, keeping the city safe.

  I shifted my gaze upward, but I didn’t meet his eyes. I looked at his hands. I saw that scar that twisted down his left hand—a slender, jagged line, a cut that could have come from anything but served as a vivid reminder that Guardians were made of flesh, that they hurt and bruised and bled. I’d seen the wounds on my mother too many times to pretend nothing could harm her.

  And Leon’s words came back to me. What my mother faced. Worse than I’d met, he’d told me.

  Worse than I could imagine.

  I was imagining now. Not imagining what I’d seen in the alley, or almost seen—that blur of eyes and rippling skin, that sense of something waiting. Not those dreams of Kelly and Tink, flashes of red and then darkness. Not a threat against myself. I was imagining my mother. Dead.

  Leon must’ve seen it on my face.

  “Lucy’s tough,” he said. “You don’t need to worry about her.”

  “I always worry about her,” I said. “But now I’ll worry more.”

  “You’ll adapt,” he repeated. “That comes with the territory. It’s part of being a Guardian’s kid.”